Advancement of Gender Statistics

The Statistics Division’s work on gender statistics was initiated in the early 1980s, mid-way into the United Nations Decade for Women: Equality, Development and Peace (1976-1985) and in response to the call for more statistics on the status of women.  The programme on gender statistics carried out by UNSD has been shaped by demands from four international conferences on women and other conferences, such as the World Summit for Social Development (1995) and the International Conference on Population and Development (1994). The programme has been geared to users’ needs, and has provided technical support to women’s and gender units of the United Nations funds and programmes, statistical units of regional organizations, and national statistical offices (NSOs).

The major activities UNSD undertakes in the area of gender statistics are: reviewing standards and methods currently used in the collection of official statistics, and identifying ways of integrating a gender perspective in order to avoid biases in the data collection, presentation and dissemination; compiling and disseminating gender statistics, by making gender statistics and indicators readily available in formats and media that are not only easily accessible to users, but also well understood; and providing a variety of technical assistance in gender statistics to national statistical offices, regional programmes and United Nations agencies. This support has ranged from organizing training workshops and other meetings at the interregional, regional and national levels to providing direct technical assistance to countries, agencies and other institutions.

UNSD also serves as Secretariat of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS), first convened in 2006. The IAEG-GS functions through advisory groups on gender statistics databases and indicators, gender statistics training and gender statistics legislation, etc. In addition, the IAEG-GS maintains a dedicated website for the Global Gender Statistics Programme providing a platform for the dissemination of developments in the field of gender statistics, as well as fostering inter-agency collaboration through the Inter-agency and expert group on gender statistics.